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New Leader Is Called a Trust Builder

If the directors of Hewlett-Packard had set out to find a leader who was the antithesis of Carleton S. Fiorina, they could hardly have done better than Mark V. Hurd, an affable Midwesterner who is almost entirely unknown in Silicon Valley.

Mr. Hurd, 48, is best known for his turnaround of NCR, the maker of automated teller machines and electronic cash registers. His supporters say he has developed a reputation for building trust within NCR.

But his appointment took many in the technology industry by surprise, and not everyone was convinced that the decision to hire a Silicon Valley outsider from a company much smaller than Hewlett would prove to be the right one.

Patricia C. Dunn, Hewlett's chairwoman of the board, said the directors chose Mr. Hurd from a short list of candidates in part because of his "straightforward style" and his recognition of the importance of corporate culture.

"We were impressed by his emphasis on developing internal talent while reaching outside for new skills, his understanding of the role of culture in a company's success and his personal integrity," Ms. Dunn said in a statement.

Ms. Fiorina, who was ousted as Hewlett's chief executive last month, was known for her top-down management style and her charisma. Her nearly single-handed championing of the company takeover of Compaq proved to be her undoing when she failed to deliver the profits and growth she had projected.

Before joining Hewlett, Ms. Fiorina was already well known in the industry as a president of Lucent Technologies, and she continued to attract media coverage at Hewlett.

Mr. Hurd's career path has received much less outside attention. Born in New York City, he attended Baylor University in Waco, Tex., on a tennis scholarship. He received a degree in business administration in 1979 and went to work for NCR soon after that. He has spent the last 25 years at NCR in Dayton, Ohio - the last two years as its president and chief executive.

Despite his fairly low profile, Mr. Hurd, who could not be reached for comment, is widely credited with rescuing NCR when its stock price was languishing and its profits were in decline.

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"When he took over as C.E.O. of NCR you had a company without a sense of urgency, a company that wasn't doing much of anything," said Reik Read, an analyst at Robert W. Baird in Milwaukee. "He had to undo the culture and bring back the sense of urgency."

In 2004, NCR posted a profit of $284 million, a fourfold increase over the year before. With 28,500 employees, the company had revenues last year of $5.99 billon.

Mr. Read described Mr. Hurd as a team builder who is "very likable" But he is also "the kind of guy who is a change agent, a disruptive force," Mr. Read said.

The board of Hewlett almost certainly took note of the fact that Mr. Hurd spent three years running the Teradata division of NCR, its data warehousing unit. Mr. Hurd took over Teradata in 1999, and immediately set to reorganize it and cut costs, cutting his teeth in the information technology industry. "What he is known for is creating operational efficiencies," said Sam Bhavnani, an analyst at Current Analysis, a San Diego technology research company.

Charles R. Wolf, an analyst at Needham & Company, called Mr. Hurd's appointment "modestly positive," though something of a disappointment given that he has no direct experience running a company nearly as large as Hewlett-Packard, which has 150,000 employees.

"His claim to fame is turning around Teradata, but that's only 20 percent of a $6 billion company," Mr. Wolf said, comparing that with Hewlett's $80 billion in revenue last year. "There are some great C.E.O.'s in the Valley, but I would not say Mark Hurd is one of them."

Mr. Wolf said he believed that the Hewlett-Packard board might have felt tremendous pressure to act quickly, given the enormousness of the task of fixing the company.

"The question is, 'Is this the best guy for the job? My answer is 'no.' There are plenty who are far better qualified," Mr. Wolf said. "But the real question is, 'Is he the best guy they could get?' "